In fantasy leagues, such as fantasy football, each user is usually the manager of a team comprised of fictional representations of real-life persons, most commonly players in a sport. Typically, each team exists within a league of other users similarly managing their own teams. To build their team, users “draft” fictional “fantasy” players that correspond to real-life players. The user then selects a certain number of fantasy players from the user's roster to “start” and others to “bench” (not start). The list of starting fantasy players may be referred to as a “lineup.” Most commonly, a user's lineup is matched up against another user's lineup on a recurring basis, for example weekly, over the course of a specified period of time generally referred to as a “season.” For each matchup, the fantasy players on each user's lineup are awarded points based on the performance of the real-life player to whom the fantasy player corresponds. Generally speaking, the user whose lineup was awarded the most points wins the matchup.
Generally, fantasy sport seasons reflect real sports' actual seasons. For example, if the fantasy sport is football, where a team usually plays one team per week and the season culminates in a single winner, the corresponding fantasy football league usually also pits a user against one other user per week and the users' performances over the course of the season determines which team is the winner.
A variety of fantasy games exist on the market, including those designed to work on desktop computers, mobile phones, or tablets. There are many variations on fantasy games, including how points are scored, how teams are formed, how the teams in each league play each other, and league rules. However, the problem of optimizing the fantasy sports experience remains unsolved.
One attempt to optimize the fantasy sports experience can be seen in U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0210330 A1 filed by Fleming, which generally discloses a fantasy sports system and method aimed at optimizing the draft process. Unfortunately, this disclosure fails to provide for a draft process that assigns a value to each player, wherein the value changes over the course of the season based on the player's performance. Moreover, this disclosure does not allow a user to construct a lineup from players of more than one sport.
Another attempt to optimize the fantasy sports experience can be seeing in U.S. Pat. No. 7,699,707 to Bahou, which generally discloses a fantasy sports system and method aimed at optimizing the scoring process. While this disclosure does generally provide for a near-real-time scoring system, this disclosure fails to provide for a deep-learning algorithm that provides real-time scoring information.
Yet another attempt to optimize the fantasy sports experience can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 7,614,944 to Hughes, which generally discloses a fantasy sports system and method aimed at optimizing the league play element. While this disclosure does generally provide for a multi-level fantasy sports league experience, this disclosure fails to provide for a “bullpen” or inactive league level that incentivizes players to get back in the game.
Still, none of these in existence comprise the beneficial characteristics described in the following disclosure. Thus, there remains a need for a system and method for a fantasy game system and method that optimizes the draft process, the points scoring system, and the manner in which users move up or down through better or worse leagues, respectively, among other benefits.